The Glass Room (Vera Stanhope 5)

while for Joe to realize it was Nina Backworth.
    ‘What the shit’s she doing here? Who let her onto the beach?’ He was glad to have an outlet for his frustration. Nobody answered, and he took off suddenly and strode towards the woman, allowing the salt water and the wet sand to splash his trousers.
    ‘You shouldn’t be here, you know,’ he said, while she was still at some distance away from him. His voice was raised.
    ‘Why?’
    She was very pale. He knew she’d found the body. Her story had predicted the murder. Her sleeping pills had knocked out Tony Ferdinand. And now she was here. Checking they’d found the coat and the knife? But still he couldn’t imagine her as a killer.
    ‘Because the area’s forensically sensitive,’ he said.
    ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ She spoke to him as if he were a particularly stupid student. ‘The tide’s been over here this morning. Any evidence will be halfway to Norway.’
    They stared at each other. He didn’t know what to say to her.
    ‘I’ve been sitting in the library all bloody morning,’ she said at last. Tears began to roll down her cheeks and he saw how tired and scared she was. ‘Nobody will tell me anything. Holly talks at me, but there’s no information, just fatuous empty words. Am I under arrest? Do you all think I killed Miranda Barton?’
    ‘No!’ As he had in her room the day before, he wanted to put his arms around her shoulders. If it hadn’t been for the audience in the shadow of the cliff he might have done it. ‘But you can’t stay here. Come back with me, and I’ll try to find out if you’re free to go. Or at least if you can join the others in the hotel.’
    ‘No!’ She was standing very close to him. The refusal, an echo of his own word, reminded him of his daughter in one of her stubborn moods. At those times, nothing would persuade the child to change her mind. She’d just repeat herself: No, no, no.
    ‘Don’t you see?’ Nina cried. ‘One of those people is a killer. They slashed Miranda’s throat. How can you expect me to sit in a room with them all? To drink tea and make polite conversation.’
    She turned away from him and stamped back towards the house. He had to run to catch her up.

Chapter Twenty-Three
    Vera climbed the narrow stairs in the Bartons’ cottage and dipped her head under a low beam to reach a landing. A narrow passage with three doors off. It was almost dark; the only light slanted up from the kitchen below. She presumed Alex Barton was still there, sitting in the rocking chair, still not communicating with the uniformed officer she’d called back to mind him. Vera pulled on gloves before opening each of the doors and looking inside. There were two bedrooms and a bathroom.
    She checked out the bathroom first. It was tiny, with a small corner bath and a shower built over it, a basin and lavatory. No room for a chair or a cupboard, except for a small unit fixed to the wall above the sink. Mirrored doors. Inside a wrapped bar of soap and some toothpaste. Over-the-counter medicines, remedies for colds and flu, indigestion. No sleeping tablets. Had Alex Barton come here last night and showered? Had he stood in the bath and washed his mother’s blood from his skin? If so, they’d find traces of it perhaps, in the outflow pipe. But the room seemed spotless to Vera. There was a smell of bleach. Not in itself suspicious. Perhaps the Bartons were naturally very clean. She wasn’t that way inclined herself, but it was known.
    Alex had the smaller bedroom. It was built into the roof at the front, with a view over the yard. There was no double-glazing and Vera could hear the talk from below, could sense the anticipation even from here. There’d been a discovery. She knew she’d be excited later, but at the moment the chatter was just background noise in her head and she tried to filter it out. Now she wanted to focus on these people and the strange relationship that there’d been between them. A single parent and an only child. It could make for the closest relationship in the world. But it could be a deadly combination.
    The young man’s bedroom was functional and so tidy that it made Vera uncomfortable. A psychologist might say it indicated a need to control. There was a three-quarter-sized bed against one wall, the duvet folded back at exactly halfway of its length to air the bottom sheet. Under the window, in the part of the room where the ceiling was most low, a small desk held a PC. There was no